For students
Advice, resources, & tours for student travelers in the U.K.
First of all: I envy you. One of the best year of my life was the one I spent studying abroad in Europe. Learned a lot. Traveled a lot. Met the love of my life. Yep: good times. (Also, my parents were footing the travel bill. Thanks, Mom and Dad!)
Student IDs - The ISIC
The only international-accepted student ID is the International Student Identity Card, or ISIC (www.isic.org), a $22 investment that can save you hundreds of dollars on your travels.
Yes, the ISIC card works much better than your own student ID. Not only is it instantly recognized everywhere, it also gets you all sorts of other perks, including discounts on the Heathrow Express and National Express coaches; Eurail tickets; at hostels and hostel-booking sites; some tours, sights (eg: London Eye, Westminster Abbey, Tower of London), and restaurants; Lonely Planet guidebooks; cellphone or SIM-card rentals; a 24-hour help line emergency service; access to flexible airfares; discounts at the Apple Store and Target.com; and basic travel accident and sickness insurance.
Just beyond student-hood
If you're no longer a student but are still under 26 you can get an International Youth Identity Card from the same people, which will get you the insurance and some of the discounts (but not student admission prices in museums).
Teacher ID cards - The ITIC
By the way, the ISIC folks also provide the standard and widely accepted International Teacher Identity Card, or ITIC. This, too, is good for all sorts of discounts.
Like a student, announce to museum ticket desks (and anywhere else) that you are a teacher or professor and watch the discounts materialize—sometimes you even get in for free (though sometimes only if you have a class in tow).
Student airfares
Important point to understand from the outset: there's no guarantee that a "student fare" will be the cheapest one available.
Seriously. In these days of deep discounting and fire-sale prices, you'll often fare better just searching out a cheap ticket the way the rest of us who can no longer pass for the picture of the guy on our old college ID cards do. (Start here to do that.)
Why bother with a student fare? The flexibility.
But here's where student fares come in real handy. Most cheap fares have a maximum stay of 30 days.
That just ain't long enough, whether you're studying abroad or simply taking a few months to bum around Europe. (Though sometimes you'll find a cheap fare with a return window of nine months, which might be plenty.) Other fares are only good for travel from a certain date to a certain date, and that "to" date falls well before you plan to come home again.
However, there are special air tickets designed for student needs that might be worth the extra expense.
I'm talkin' long-term or open-ended airfares that'll let you traipse around the Continent for three or four months, or study abroad for a year (yes, go for a full year; don't bother signing up for this namby-pamby single semester stuff—you'll thank me later) without having to know yet what date you'll finally drag your sorry ass back Stateside for the fall semester.
(Hint: try for three days before classes start again; that should be enough time to do laundry, get in some quality time with the folks, and make your way back to campus.)
Those kind of open-ended tickets are available to anyone, of course, but usually they come at a premium—and when I say "premium" I mean four figures, and the first one ain't necessarily a "1." For students, you can get the same open-ended deal for much less.
Where to find student airfares
Your friendly neighborhood travel agent (if you can find one not put out of business by the Internet) should be able to help.
But for real bargains, go straight to the student travel experts. Since such outfits as Aussie-born STA and Mass-based Student Universe specialize in backpacking students, they're adept at finding rock-bottom rates for all folks in high school, college, grad school—just about anyone under age 26, as well as teachers, though they'll search great deals for anyone.
- Myisic.com - International Student Identity Cards from STA Travel.Partner
- Statravel.com - Premier travel agency for students (and teachers), providing everything from discounted airfares to international cell phones and calling plans to the ISIC student identity card. I used them (well, their predecessor, Council Travel) to book the big ticket items like airfare when I took my Boy Scout troop to Europe.Partner
- Studentuniverse.com - Online rival to STA, with decent line on cheap airfares.
- Travelcuts.com - Premier Canadian student travel agency. All the services of STA for our Canuck neighbors to the north.
- Goabroad.com - Intel on studying abroad.
- Ciee.org - CIEE is the preeminent organization devoted to American students studying abroad (and their professors).
- Nrcsa.com - National Registration Center for Studies Abroad.
- Aifs.com - American Institute for Foreign Study.
- iie.org - Institute of International Education.
- Booking.com - Booking.com lists more than 350 hostels across the U.K., with nearly 100 in London alone, complete with verified user reviews.Partner
- Hostelz.com - An aggregator shows you the rates its can find at multiple booking engines at once, so you can find the lowest price out there on hostels and other cheap accommodations.Partner
- Independenthostels.co.uk - A guide to about 400 hostels, bunkhouses, and camping barns all across Great Britain, including England, Scotland, and Wales. It is much stronger in the countryside, towns, and smaller cities than in London (which is pretty much ignores, weighing in with less than half a dozen).
- Yha.org.uk - The official hostelling site, linking to all 158 official YHA hostels and bunkhouses in the U.K. This does mean, however, it ignores the many, many excellent private hostels.
- Hostelworld.com - Booking site with hostels, cheap hotels, apartments, and B&Bs in more than 80 destinations across England, including an impressive 184 in London alone. Partner
- Bookhostels.com - A classic hostel booking engine, offering deals on more than 115 hostels in London alone.Partner
- Statravel.com - This travel agency can point you to a variety of small group student and youth tours.Partner
- Eftours.com - Since the 1960s, a top purveyor of educational, cultural-immersion, and service learning tours for students and youths.
- Contiki.com - Longest established youth tour company aimed at 18–35 year olds.
- Efcollegebreak.com - Branch of EF Tours aimed at college break times and strictly for those aged 18–28.
- Aesu.com - Tours and travel programs for students and young professionals since 1977.
- Wsaeurope.com - Weekend Student Adventures are jsut what they sound like: Whirlwind weekend trips in Europe's top cities, including tours, meals, and two nights lodging in a hostel. The company was founded and run by Andy Steves, son of famous guidebook author Rick Steves.
- Explorica.com - This is actually a tour company that teachers or youth-group leaders can sign up to use to provide all the actual travel arrangments for their class or group.
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This bespired gothic 13C wonder is one of the great cathedrals of Europe
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The history of London Town from prehistoric times to the 21C, told in artifacts, scale models, archaeological finds, photographs, and paintings
A small, free city museum of London life, Victorian and Pre-Raphaelite art, and Roman ruins in the basement
A vast park in North London, with lovely views, wooded rambles, swimming ponds, cozy pubs, and Old Master art in a genteel manor house
A 17th century manor house in Hampstead Heath with a fabulous free art collection
London's 18th century church steepling Trafalgar Square hosts excellent free lunchtime concerts with a cheap cafe in the crypt
A gallery of some of the greatest hits of British painting and sculpture
Fantastic, small, bit-of-everything museum—ancient Roman and Egyptian sculptures; paintings by Turner, Reynolds, and Hogarth; architectural remnants and Cantonese furniture—all crammed into the formerly private home of an eclectic collector
An historic London townhouse filled with 18C antiques and French and Old Master paintings—all for free
Giant white horses carved into the grass of chalk hillsides, some dating back to the 18C
Bath's small public art museum has a nice collection including Gainsborough oil pantings
London's Catohlic cathedral is notable for free organ concerts and boys' choir—and for NOT being the far more famous Westminster Abbey
A church with a view and a cafe right in front of the Radcliffe Camera
Free greeter programs around the world encourage locals to welcome you to their hometown
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Trading spaces isn't just a show on basic cable anymore. It's a way to live life like a local on your travels absolutely for free—so long as you let the local borrow your life (and home) in return.
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Couchsurfing and other hospitality networks allow you to sleep for free in other member's homes
Hospitality networks gather folks who are willing to put up fellow members in their homes for free or for a small fee
Sleep for free on vacation by watching someone's house (and, often, watering their plants and feeding their cat)
Programs like WWOOF and Helpx let you barter your services for a free place to stay
If you love sailing, or just have an unquenchable taste for adventure and new experiences, you can sign on to help crew a boat just about anywhere in the world, including the U.K.
A network of free stone cabins where you can sleep off the beaten path in the U.K.
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Couchsurfing and other hospitality networks allow you to sleep for free in other member's homes
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A room with "external facilities" (shared bath down the hall) always costs less for this minor inconvenience
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Hotels' official star ratings have nothing to do with how clean, central, comfortable, or charming a hotel is—just how many (often pointless) amenities it offers
Sleep for free on vacation by watching someone's house (and, often, watering their plants and feeding their cat)
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Programs like WWOOF and Helpx let you barter your services for a free place to stay
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Prix-fisse, tourist menu, lunch menu—a fixed-price or set tourist menu may not be the best meal you could have at that restaurant, but it's certainly often the best budget option
Be your own chef and you can save money and add an extra cultural experience to your trip
From fish 'n' chip to food trucks, there are many excellent (and inexpensive) British versions of fast food to try
Skip the big slab of meat and order two starters instead—more variety, lower cost
This sightseeing pass gets you into more than 60 London sights and attractions for free (skipping the line at each), with loads of other discounts, and it comes with a public transportation option
Use Skype (and an internet connection) to make and receive free voice and video calls—or have your friends and family Skype your cell in the U.K. for 10¢ per minute or $1–$2 per month.
T-mobile offers the cheapest international roaming—it works in 140 countries and costs as little as $10–20 per month for voice and data.
Enjoy free admission to various London sights and monuments (along with skip-the-line privileges), discounts at other attractions, and even transportation
This London Flexi Attractions Pass covers some of the pricey sights the London Pass does not:
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